At Least One Good Thing Happened
by Stargazer at Moonlight
Summary: Cliffjumper x Mirage: Pre-slash. Violence. How Cliffjumper ends up as Mirage's roommate.


At Least One Good Thing Happened

Cliffjumper x Mirage

Words: 1955

Notes: OOC-Cliffjumper and Mirage, mentions of extreme violence, I also am not a fan of Ironhide x Chromia but it fits the fic a bit and I thought it was a nice little twist

Rating: T

Characters: Cliffjumper, Mirage, Ratchet, Bumblebee, Optimus, mentions of Ironhide and a femme on Cyberton (Chromia)

Summary: How Cliffjumper ends up as Mirage's roommate.

Author's Notes: there should be a sequel out soon, but it may take a while depending on college – Thanks to the one review, I have tweaked this and changed a bit. I hope you like it.

_Such a weakling_, the smaller red mech thought as he got his first look at the new recruit. A slimly built white and blue mech stood next to the Prime waiting patiently for all of the Autobots to assemble. The way he stood there so unemotionally grated on Cliffjumper's nerves. He seemed to be too relaxed for the minibot's liking as if he expected everything happening.

As the last Autobot filed into the room, the Prime cleared his throat and waited for those assembled to quiet before speaking. "We have a new member joining out team on the Ark today. This is Mirage. He is assigned to the Special Ops division and will finish his training to our Third-in-Command's standards shortly.

Optimus moved off, Mirage heading in the opposite direction. _So this was it?_, he wondered. Cliffjumper glanced around the room as the twin frontliners broke out the high grade for a party. The slim mech seemed to have already slipped off and left the beginning of the party.

_I guess he was too high class for this._ The red minibot shrugged. The parties never lost momentum until they were broken up – usually by Prowl or Prime.

As he reached for a cube of the high grade sitting on the table, he was surprised to see it suddenly disappear. That couldn't be right. He hadn't even drunk anything yet so he couldn't have imagined it being there. Maybe he needed to reset his optics? But Ratchet had fixed them after he had gotten slagged at the beginning of the joor, so that couldn't be it.

"What in Pit?" he muttered, grabbing one of the other available cubes. "I need a good recharge and defrag."

He stayed at the party for a little while before slipping off to rest.

* * *

><p>"You are to provide back up for Mirage on this mission, Cliffjumper. You'll put aside your dislike of the mech and do your job," Optimus said to the minibot.<p>

_Does he honestly think I'd not do my job just because I don't like the mech? I've worked with the frontliner twins before and Huffer and Gears._

He huffed a breath in annoyance. "Yes, sir."

The door to the Prime's office opened to admit the Special Ops agent.

"You commed, sir?"

"Yes. You have one breem to lay out the plan assigned to you to Cliffjumper. He will be your back up. After that, I expect the mission to have started. Dismissed."

The two bots left the room and headed towards the Ark exit. Cliffjumper sighed heavily as he felt the now invisible bot place a hand on his shoulder. He was not a big fan of physical contact. As they passed through the entrance less than a quarter of a breem later, he shrugged the Towers bot's hand from his shoulder.

"What's the specifics of the mission? Preferably just those related to me."

* * *

><p>"Something tells me that we aren't supposed to be getting shot at," the red minibot grumbled as more laser fire flashed overhead. "Can you see who's out there?"<p>

"Soundwave's cassettes are here, so Soundwave should be near. A couple of those extremely low in the hierarchy too. I think one of them is Dead End, but I don't see Motormaster so I can't be sure," a disembodied voice said quietly.

Cliffjumper hummed thoughtfully. "I got a plan. Your information is needed back at base. I'll create a distraction. You get the Pit out of here. Radio for back up as soon as possible, but continue back to base." He didn't wait for the spy to agree, but began a short countdown. While doing so, he slipped the rifle he had been using back into subspace and pulled a few bombs out along with a gun that was the Cybertonian equivalent of a human shotgun.

Mirage stared for a moment as Cliffjumper launched himself out from behind their cover, lobbing a bomb towards the Decepticons. Mentally kicking himself, he scrambled out of the area they had been pinned down in and made a mad dash for Autobot territory. The noise he made was covered by the din of the battle.

_Cliffjumper really is an amazing mech,_ he thought, noting vaguely that the minibot couldn't have been captured yet as no one was focused on him.

As soon as he felt himself move outside of the Decepticon's comm. disruptor range, he radioed the Ark for help and sent Cliffjumper's last known coordinates. Without conscious thought he found himself following the orders given him and speeding back to the Ark.

Upon his arrival, the mechs being sent to aid him were just leaving the entrance. As one they stopped to look at him before shrugging and turning to go back inside. The bot they had been told to help was standing in front of them. Mirage noticed mome of this as he rushed to Prime's office to deliver the information he had gathered.

"Mirage," Optimus greeted as the mech strode into his office. "I see you have returned safely. Congratulations on a job well done."

"Thank you, sir." He retrieved a data chip from his subspace and handed it to the Prime. "Here is the information requested."

"Good. May I inquire as to where Cliffjumper is?"

"He sent me on to bring that here," the spy answered with a nod to the chip. "I requested back up for him when I contacted base, sir. He was holding the Decepticons off so that I was able to get away the last time I saw him.

"Thank you, Mirage. That will be all."

The blue and white Ops agent nodded respectfully before leaving the office in search of energon for his depleted systems.

* * *

><p>"Have you seen Cliffjumper recently?" Bumblebee asked Mirage.<p>

"The last time I saw him he was shooting 'Cons as a distraction. Some mechs were supposed to go help him."

"Nobody's left base today besides you two other than for patrol."

They looked at each other in horror. The minibot had been out there for a joor without back up? They raced for the exit immediately after overcoming their shock and peeled out as quickly as possible, Mirage leading them back to the area he had come from earlier in the day.

Reaching the small ravine where they had hidden, Mirage activated his cloaking device and stepped onto the battlefield delicately. His optics widened at the carnage. There were a number of places where mech outlines with energon spattered liberally throughout and a few offlined bots that weren't salvageable layed scattered through the area, greyed-out forms barely recognizable as more than parts. Most of the metal lying around was unrecognizable as any particular part.

A splash of red caught his optic causing him to cautiously pick his way over to it. The mech was barely recognizable as the mech that he had left earlier in the day. Most of his plating was gone, exposing his protoform to the elements. What was left had been severely shredded. One of his optics was shattered, the other fractured. It appeared that his right leg strut was broken since the protoform was bent at an extremely awkward angle. His fingers were broken at each joint on one of his hands and numerous dents and scratches littered his protoform.

"Comm Ratchet!" Mirage shouted to Bumblebee. "And I don't care what has to be said or done, but get his after out here ASAP!" He pulled a medical kit from his subspace and started clamping lines and assessing what he could do and what required a trained medic.

* * *

><p>Finally back at the med bay after a few hours, Mirage hovered uncertainly by an empty berth while Ratchet worked on more of Cliffjumper's repairs. He was in stable condition not that his energon lines had been repaired or replaced as the case may be.<p>

"Get me a cube, Mirage," the medic said without glancing up from his work. "There's a dispenser in my office. Grab one for yourself too. You didn't refuel earlier."

* * *

><p>The CMO groaned and stretched hours later. "He's as fixed as he's going to get until I can get more armor for him. If you want, you can stay here, but be sure to recharge on a berth." With those final instructions, Ratchet left the medbay.<p>

Mirage stood for a moment indecisive. Did he wasn't to stay or go to his own berth? As Cliffjumper's form twitched, he decided. One of the empty berths was pushed right up against the one occupied by the minibot and slowly the spy relaxed onto it and sleepily reached a hand out to rest on Cliffjumper's arm to confirm for himself that the mech was still there.

* * *

><p>Ratchet returned to the med bay the following morning to find a blue and white chassis curled around a red and grey form. He chuckled softly at the sight and began to gather the information he would have to gather for Cliffjumper about his armor.<p>

* * *

><p>Cliffjumper awoke suddenly, but slowly, curling as close to the warm chassis next to him as possible. He felt far too cold for his liking. Normally his armor kept the heat radiated by his protoform from dissipating quickly, so he really should feels so cold.<p>

"You know, as cute as that is, it isn't really going to be a long-term solution." The medic's voice jolted him out of his peaceful relaxation mode, causing him to jar the mech curled around him from recharge.

"What the frag, Ratch?" he asked testily, sitting up but refusing to look behind himself to see who he had curled into like he would a blanket. He didn't want to know which bot he wouldn't be able to look in the optic after this.

"I need your armor specs and we need to figure out where you'll be until Wheeljack and I can manufacture new parts." Ratchet watched as the spy that had been curled around the minibot silently climbed off of the berth and activated his cloaking device. It went without saying that the mech would have to stay in the med bay until someone entered or left so that he wouldn't cause suspiscions.

Cliffjumper offered one of the jacks set in his wrist to the medic and pulled the pertinent file up for transfer. "I had a few upgrades over the vorns that are also included."

"One other thing I want to know is why your protoform is built almost as sturdily as your armor is."

"Doc, my family lived on the rough side of town and couldn't pay for a nice refined protoform. They chose one of the bulkiest ones, but there was less work that had to go into making it so it was cheaper. Few of the families went that route though. Femmes were more prevalent than mechs where I'm from. In fact, I had five older sisters and two younger before the war started."

"What happened to them?" the medic asked, fearing he knew what had.

"Well. The Decepticons did offline most of the femmes. I have one surviving sister that I know of and she is with the femmes on Cybertron. She's been happily bonded since before the war, so I don't fear for her. Why do you think I check on Ironhide while he's here?"

The red minibot chuckled at the medic's expression. One would think he would know this stuff, but apparently not.

"There is one thing, Cliffjumper. You will not be staying by yourself. The only bot I know that has the room for you is Mirage. Will you be able to stay there without slagging him?"

"Ratch," Cliffjumper sighed. "Did I slag the mech while we were on the mission? No. I think I can live with him."


End file.
